Page 505

Friday, December 5, 1997

Entry 17

“Umbra is dangerous!” Amara's gaze met Alice's. “We should banish it from our research.”

“You can't be serious, Amara,” I pressed out more tensely than I had intended.

How could she be so naive? Especially now?

“The Domini is still in a coma and the Circle…”

I stepped closer, driven by inner rage, and the words just burst out of me.

“Damn it, you're the next Domini!” I tried to lower my voice a little, but it didn't work. “You have the choice of whether Umbra remains a misunderstood mystery or flourishes again in its former glory.”

“You sound like a foolish poet, Alaister,” Bastien laughed, and I spun around.

“Bastien, he's right. Umbra could change everything. Maybe even bring the species together.”

I managed to turn my angry gaze away from him and toward the most beautiful girl in the room. She somehow made me believe in something, if not in myself.

She had told me this morning in the library that she wanted to use Umbra to heal her mother, and I felt like a traitor because I didn't know if I would ever be able to betray my own mother for Alice. I just hoped that she would eventually stop putting Rosalynd in an artificial coma. If she really didn't care about her, Rosalynd would already be dead.

“You've seen Alaister and Diana's research results. Nothing will ever connect us,” Bastien replied impatiently, his godforsaken gaze lingering on her lips.

I wished I had burned those results. I wished I could just ignore the fact that he was looking at her the way I wanted to look at her.

“Umbra could change that,” I muttered instead, not wanting to get his hopes up. The mere idea that the two of them could have children together was devastating.

He looked at me again. “I’m sorry, but that’s beyond my imagination.”

I turned to the other members. “Come on, guys, you can’t all agree with him.”

Alarik paced back and forth in front of the fireplace with his usual absent-minded look, as if something was bothering him, but he didn't say anything. Instead, he stared into the flames, his eyes glowing yellow.

He hadn't even spoken out against Umbra, but he hadn't spoken out in favor of it either.

“Umbra isn't banned for no reason.”

I looked back at Amara. She was actually the only one I had to convince, but her paranoia had only increased since Rosalynd's coma.

My sister said nothing. She just stared at me. And I knew exactly what she was thinking when I mentioned Umbra. And I regretted ever letting her get so close to me, even though she was my sister.

“Diana,” I asked my research partner.

“I'm sorry, Alaister,” she sighed, barely looking at me. We got along well, but she was too sensible. “But I don't think the danger posed by Umbra can be accurately assessed yet. Especially the side effects. And I don't know if we should continue researching it. Especially not on your body.”

A frustrated snort escaped me. “I'm fine.”

“Umbra changes you. It makes you more aggressive, and at the same time, it consumes you,” Amara began, pointing at me. “Look at your hands.”

I ignored the prominent veins.

If Amara only knew that Umbra caused me less pain than anything else in my life, she might understand me.

“Sometimes you have to make sacrifices to achieve something greater,” I murmured, and none of them, except Alice, managed to look me in the eye.

Alarik paused in front of the fireplace and turned his head toward me. His jaw was working, but he still said nothing.